#kalagang

Hello, everyone. I never thought this day would come.

Don't know if you remember, but I was heavily involved in the Sense8 fandom on this platform especially between 2017 and 2018. I was a staunch Kalagang worshipper and one of the loudest voices here against Rajalagang and the whole finale. The show's abrupt cancellation on June 2017 had left me speechless, incredulous, depressed, and I had welcomed the news of a last-minute special granted by Netflix to wrap everything up with hope, joy and trepidous expectation. After all, the production costs were so onerous that the writers themselves had most likely already had to shelve their initial plan for a five seasons show in favour of a three seasons endevour, which meant that the story could have been satisfactorily concluded had one last season been greenlighted. A two-and-a-half hour special would have had to sacrifice some things in favour of others, sure, but to this day I do believe it was an incredibly good compromise and could have provided a good ending.

But when it came out, it felt like the entire world came crushing down onto me. I remember it not feeling like Sense8 at all, having a lot of pacing, writing and directing issues, and plenty of OOC moments and character destruction all around. It effectively killed my attachment to the show and somewhat left me in a mourning state for at least an entire year. But as you all know, time mends; life gest messy and busy; I was finally able to move on to other things. Covid also happened, which obviously changed everything and which I'm sure, if Sense8 hadn't been cancelled before, would have significantly impacted its production as well, forcing the writers and producers to make other kinds of compromises. It's entirely possible that Sense8, as it was envisioned at the beginning and carefully built in the first two seasons, was simply not destined to fulfil his great premises and come to fruition. Life is unpredictable, and many other promising shows took Covid's toll and died because of it. That said, despite moving on from Sense8, I was sure I wouldn't be able to come to a time and place where I could revisit the show with enough detachment that could make me able to enjoy it again, anew. But this year, that time finally came, and I rewatched it for the first time since the finale came out in 2018.

And I have to say, despite having changed in many ways since that period, I was surprised to realize how little my own opinions have changed on the show. I still think Sense8 is great and had all the possibilities to become a generational show and fulfil the Wachowski's plan, which was to create something for TV that could have had the same impact The Matrix had had on cinema. I still totally see and feel that. The show has not aged a single bit, especially in the cinematography compartment, except maybe in some faltering bits of writing which, as far as I'm concerned, has always been the show's Achille's heel. The concept is still the coolest thing I have ever seen and I constantly see it somewhat replicated in other ventures (last but not least, in Spielberg's Disclosure Day). The characters are so full of life and with so much potential. Season 1 starts fairly slow buy once it picks up it quickly gest amazing. Season 2 is phenomenal. What left me particularly surprised is the acting: I admit I didn't remember it being this consistently good (not only from the mains but also secondaries and guest appearances), especially given how diverse of a cast there was on set.

Season 2 was so good, in fact, that by approaching the dreadful finale I was really under the impression that maybe my first reaction to it had been exaggerated, colored by my devotion to Kalagang and by how many scenarios I had the time to envision between May 2017 and June 2018 on how it could have all ended. It couldn't have been as bad as I remembered; surely I would change my mind or my outlook on it. But I really, really didn't. I was able to last half the episode, but as soon as the infamous scene with Kala and Wolfgang meeting for the first time began, I had to turn it off. It's shocking how bad it is. In terms of pacing, it's all over the place and it's a complete shift from the atmosphere the previous episode had ended on, which the binge-watching made it even more difficult to ignore. The writing is disgraceful. Most characters are either unrecognizable (Kala, Capheus, Lito, Sun, Mun, Wolfgang once he's rescued) or sloppy and incredibly chopped down (Will, Riley, Hernando, Daniela, Whispers, Jonas, Lila). I mantain my original idea that the only characters well-served by this episode, and well-written, are Nomi and Amanita (but sadly, often at this expense of all the others, which makes it unbearable to witness). Overall, this episode is so bad and on so many fronts that I don't know how this managed to escape, and still manages to escape, so many people.

Having clarified that, some things about the show I changed opinion on. For one, I'm much more sympathetic towards Rajan and much less towards Kala with relation to the way their story unfolds. Rajan is nothing but always, completely accomodating to her, and I don't think the show actually ever wants you to think he doesn't sincerely love Kala. In S1, he does nothing but speak highly of her, is willing to go against his cultural traditions and wear a wedding ring to outwardly express his commitment to her, is willing to marry her a second time despite Kala trying to manipulate him in not doing so and is willing to fight his father's opposition, something upon which Kala tries to conjure up an imputation of malice. From his point of view, the story is clear and coherent, and he never once wishes anything on Kala that it isn't her happiness, and everything he does is a direct result of Kala lying to him and leading him on on the belief that their union is a love marriage, which she knows it's not. The same thing happens in the Christmas special: because of Wolfgang pushing her away, Kala is gaslighting herself into thinking she actively wants to build a life with Rajan, and he indulges her out of complete innocence. Talking with Priya behind her back on their lack of sex is surely questionable, but it's somewhat understandable given the fact that Rajan is as new to marriage as Kala is, thinks Kala loves him and yet has to face the fact that something has to be wrong. And however, even besides that, he instantly apologizes to her, and while acting morally-righteous she proceeds to lie to him again by saying she doesn't have second thoughts anymore.

And then there's Rajan's Pharma fraud uncovered by mid-S2, which is unequivocally the greater stain on Rajan's character. But, and I never would have thought it would come a day where I say this, the tendency from Kalagang stans to exploit this fraud to try to characterize Rajan as an irredeamable, evil at heart monster is incredibly disingenuous and short-sighted. I think that episode clarifies that: 1) Rajan was merely following without thinking the standard procedure his father's company, and likely every other company, had been operating on since forever, which at best could make him reckless or irresponsible, not exactly wicked; and 2) as soon as Kala confronts him about it, he is actively shown to put into question everything he has ever believed and been taught for all his life by his father regarding his company, which he characterizes as a religious belief, and the episode clearly wants you to take from this that Rajan is going to change these practices and fight corruption.

All of this to say that, Rajan is certainly not without his flaws, but I don't think the show was portraying him as an evil man, and I don't think Kala herself has ever thought he was anything other than a good man, which is why she was unmoving, until the end, on not wanting to hurt him. But of course, this changes nothing on the matter: Kala's storyline had nothing to do with Rajan's goodness and everything to do with her lack of feelings towards him and her need to free herself from this self-made cage she entrapped herself into in order to please others and satisfy cultural expectations. The fact that Rajan was a good man, on a narrative standpoint, was not supposed to be an excuse for Kala to not overcome this obstacle: it was supposed to be a factor that made overcoming this obstacle even harder, and therefore more necessary and satisfying on a storytelling perspective. Besides, Kala had A LOT to own up to, both to Wolfgang and to Rajan, and the finale egregiously failed to give her character the moral chatarsis she desperately needed to atone for her lies and misleading behavior. What the finale did, by pretending Kala was merely afraid Rajan wouldn't believe her about being a sensate and undecided on her feelings for two men, not only eradicated her need to choose, which was pivotal to her character, but also the responsibilities and consequences she had to face and own up to. That ultimately makes it very hard to sympathize with her, because it looks like her questionable behavior for two seasons is ultimately excused by the narrative. In fact, on a moral standpoint, Rajan clearly ends up having the higher ground on her, which is incredibly sad - if anything, because Rajan is a supportive character and Kala is a main, so the story feels broken, inverted in a fundamental way.

On a closing note, I remember and get the amount of hate directed at Netflix at the time for the show's cancellation, but now I think they handled this as well as they could, and granting the final episode was indeed incredibly generous given the lack of viewership and the giant production costs involved. If anything, their mistake was failing to properly advertise that S2 was coming out when it did, even though their modus operandi has always been to pump up a new show by highly publicizing its first season and then barely make notice for the following seasons, with the exception of their peak products in popularity (such as Stranger Things, Bridgerton, Wednesday, etc.).